On his first day in jail undercover, a former gang member-turned-chaplain learned things would be different this time around

"60 Days
In" is a documentary series that follows seven undercover
inmates at a jail in Pinal County, Arizona.

The undercover inmates quickly learned in jail, their race
played a role in virtually all social interactions, from eating
to watching TV.

One participant, a chaplain and former gang member named
Abner, said race was even more important than gang affiliations,
and members of rival gangs coexisted if they were of the same
race.

At Pinal County Adult Detention Center in Florence, Arizona, an
inmate's race dictates everything from where he sleeps and who he
eats lunch with to when he gets his hair cut and what he watches
on TV.

The participants were given false identities and booked under
fake charges before being sent to live among the jail's
500-inmate population. Only a small group of administrators,
including Pinal County Sheriff Mark Lamb, knew their secret.

The undercover inmates were tasked with finding out as much
information as possible about the inner workings of jail life and
reporting back to the sheriff after their 60-day stints.

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Immediately into their stays, the participants learned that life
in jail was highly segregated, and that race played a role in
virtually all social interactions.

One participant, a chaplain from New York City named Abner,
learned that lesson especially fast: Just moments after he
entered his assigned living area, Abner, who is Puerto Rican, was
greeted by two Latino inmates and ushered to the room where other
Latino inmates sleep.

"This jail is segregated. There's no other way around it," Abner
said on the show. "Whatever race you belong to, you have to
follow the rules."

As the participants discovered, there are three main racial
factions in the jail. "Woods," or white inmates, "kinfolk," or
black inmates, and Chicanos, the word inmates used to describe
most Hispanic inmates.

Not only did inmates eat and share cells with members of their
respective races, but they were expected to back them up in
disputes with members of other races, too. Veteran inmates are
always on the lookout for members of their own races who don't
demonstrate loyalty.

"The violence can be very violent if you're not falling in," Lamb
told Business Insider.

Abner is a former Latin Kings gang member, and the only
participant in the show's history who had previously served time
in prison. He said the biggest difference between his previous
stints behind bars and this one was that in Pinal County, even if
two inmates were members of rival gangs on the outside, they
coexisted peacefully so long as they were the same race.

"You come in white, doesn't matter what gang you belong to in the
streets - you're white," he said. "If you come in black, and
you're a Blood, a Crip, or whatever - you're black."

"I'm not used to that, because in the East Coast, your gang
is your race, and in Arizona, your race is your gang," he told
Business Insider.

caption

A group of inmates at Pinal County Adult Detention Center.

source

A&E

Even innocuous moments like haircuts are fraught with racial
tension on the show. In one early episode, after a guard delivers
hair clippers to the inmates, Abner learns that according to the
inmates' self-imposed rules, white inmates get first crack at the
clippers, followed by black inmates and then Hispanic inmates.

"I know in my mind this is about power and control," Abner said.

A black inmate eventually accuses Abner of trying to jump the
line, igniting a heated dispute that nearly turns violent.

"At home, I'm a chaplain. I go to hospitals, I feed the needy,
you know, we administer to all," Abner said. "But in here, I'm a
cholo."

In another of the jail's pods, an undercover inmate named Mark
inadvertently triggered conflict over his choice of TV channels.
When Mark, who is white, was informed it was the white faction's
day to choose a TV channel for the pod to watch, he reluctantly
asked a guard to change the channel to ESPN, angering other
inmates and thrusting him into an uncomfortable confrontation.

"I didn't want to get involved with all the inmate politics,"
said Mark, a former Army intelligence specialist. "And now, it's
like, oh my goodness, I screwed up."

Lamb said that although he doesn't approve of the racial
segregation that takes place in his facility, there's not much
administrators can do, short of dividing members of each race
into their own pods - and that "furthers the problem," he said.

"You have to understand, we don't promote these things, but it is
very hard for us to control," the sheriff told Business Insider.

"We knew we had a race issue," he added. "But it's still sobering
to see it."